Percival Everett's novel James and Kevin Fedarko's A Walk in the Park: The True Story of a Spectacular Misadventure in the Grand Canyon have received the prestigious Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction, as announced by the American Library Association. The fiction prize includes a $5,000 award. Everett's James revisits Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, focusing on Jim, an enslaved character. This novel has earned multiple honors, including the National Book Award and Kirkus Prize, and topped The New York Times best-seller list.
Allison Escoto, the chair of the selection committee, described James as "a modern masterpiece, a beautiful and important work that offers a fresh perspective from the eyes of a classic character." Fedarko's nonfiction work is praised for highlighting "the triumphs and pitfalls of exploration" in the Grand Canyon. Fedarko, a former correspondent for Time magazine, values the support of Carnegie libraries, which have been integral to his research. He stated, "The library has an important and unique collection about the Grand Canyon, and it's the backbone of the kind of history that helps form the framework of both books. Neither of them could have been done without the library."
The Carnegie Medals were established in 2012 with support from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. This year's fiction finalists also included Jiaming Tang's Cinema Love and Kavin Akbar's Martyr! The nonfiction runners-up were Adam Higginbotham's Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space and Emily Nussbaum's Cue the Sun! The Invention of Reality TV. (This story was generated by Newser's AI chatbot. Source: the AP)
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